Maltz Performing Arts Center to open with historic Violins of Hope Concert

Sold-out opening concert featuring The Cleveland Orchestra on Sunday, Sept. 27, to be televised, live-streamed online

Following 11 months of careful renovation, the Milton and Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center at The Temple – Tifereth Israel opens this Sunday, Sept. 27, with an extraordinary concert—an event not only celebrating the building’s new role as home to the performing arts at Case Western Reserve University, but also honoring its history and significance as a religious landmark. The concert will feature members of the world-renowned Cleveland Orchestra and celebrated violinist Shlomo Mintz playing restored instruments that were used before and during the Holocaust. These instruments—collectively known as the Violins of Hope—serve as testaments to the resilience of the human spirit and the power of music to lift hearts in even the most horrific of circumstances. Amnon Weinstein, a second-generation violin maker based in Tel Aviv, Israel, has collected and repaired more than 45 Holocaust-era violins from around the world, some with the Star of David on the back and others with names and dates inscribed within the instrument. The violins have been played in concerts from Jerusalem to Berlin and Charlotte, North Carolina—their only previous appearance in North America. The violins return to the U.S. stage Sunday in the Maltz Performing Arts Center’s Silver Hall. The soaring, seven-sided sanctuary has been sensitively renovated into a state-of-the-art performing arts hall. Silver Hall is named in honor of nationally recognized religious leader Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver, the Temple’s leader for nearly a half a century, and his son, Rabbi Daniel Jeremy Silver, who succeeded his father as senior rabbi. Rabbi Daniel Silver’s widow, Adele, plans to attend the opening concert and will be joined there by more than 15 Holocaust survivors. Among those leading the effort to bring Violins of Hope to Cleveland are Richard Bogomolny, chairman of the Musical Arts Association, the umbrella organization for the Cleveland Orchestra, and Milton Maltz, founder and chair of the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage and lead donor for the Milton and Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center. More than 40 individual, corporate and foundation donors provided major financial support for the initiative. The concert marks the official launch of Violins of Hope Cleveland—a community collaboration featuring more than 50 performances, exhibitions, plays, films and lectures throughout the fall across Northeast Ohio. Seven nonprofit organizations have partnered on the initiative: The Cleveland Orchestra, Case Western Reserve University, the Cleveland Institute of Music, Facing History and Ourselves, ideastream, the Jewish Federation of Cleveland and the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage. Sunday’s concert, which begins at 3 p.m., has no remaining seats, but will be broadcast live on WVIZ/PBS TV and WCLV Classical 104.9 Radio and live streamed at ideastream.org/violinsofhope. Viewers in the region can watch WVIZ/PBS on the following television channels:

• Over the air at Channel 25 and Channel 25.1
• Cable systems:
  • AT&T: Channel 25 and HD on 1025
  • Case Western Reserve: 25.1
  • Cox: Channel 13 and HD on 1013
  • Time Warner: Channel 2, 5, 10 or 13 and HD on 1002, 1005, 1010 or 1013

In addition, several organizations in the area will offer their facilities as free viewing sites, where community members can gather with friends, family and neighbors to watch this historic concert. Viewing locations include the Tinkham Veale University Center on the Case Western Reserve campus, 11038 Bellflower Road, Cleveland, as well as Beth Israel, The West Temple; 14308 Triskett Road, Cleveland (doors open at 2:30 p.m.); the Cuyahoga County Library, Parma-Snow Branch, 2121 Snow Road, Parma (doors open at 2:30 p.m.; information: 216.661.4240); and Temple Israel Akron, 91 Springside Drive, Akron (RSVP for this site to 330.665.2002). As part of the programming, the Cleveland Institute of Music (CIM) Orchestra will present “Music of the Violins of Hope,” a free concert for the community at Severance Hall at 8 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 14. CIM students will play the restored violins from the Holocaust. In addition, the violins will be featured in an exhibition at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage that runs from Oct. 1 through Jan. 3, 2016. Students from CIM and the Baldwin Wallace Conservatory of Music will periodically play violins from Weinstein’s collection during the exhibition, which incorporates narratives, imagery and video to share individual stories behind the violins. Those stories also are informing educational programs in the community. Faculty from Case Western Reserve’s interdisciplinary Judaic studies program and history and music departments are collaborating with the university’s Laura and Alvin Siegal Lifelong Learning Program to offer a range of related presentations and lectures. They will focus on topics including the music and visual art of the Holocaust, memorial architecture, and the personal stories of the last generation to witness the Holocaust. Meanwhile, middle and high school students throughout the region are studying a curriculum based on Violins of Hope this fall prepared by Facing History and Ourselves. Along with the seven sponsoring partner organizations, more than a dozen affiliate organizations are hosting programming and events related to Violins of Hope Cleveland. To learn more and view the schedule, visit violinsofhopecle.org.